


The Dark of You

by Dark_Stardust (Janie94)



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Collars, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Post-Star Trek: Into Darkness, Punishment, Redemption, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 00:15:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28608897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Janie94/pseuds/Dark_Stardust
Summary: Two months after Bones used Khan's blood to resurrect him, Jim is getting worse again. It becomes clear that he needs more of Khan's blood, but how can he trust a man designed to be nothing more than a killer?
Relationships: James T. Kirk/Khan Noonien Singh
Comments: 5
Kudos: 46





	The Dark of You

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, so I wanted to write a Khirk fix-it the moment I had finished watching "Star Trek: Into Darkness" and was walking out of the cinema halls in 2013. Almost eight years later I finally started to do something about it, but I guess better late than never.  
> This is my first Star Trek fanfic and my knowledge is limited to the three AU movies (I'll do something about that lack of knowledge, I promise!), so please be kind to me. I'm already nervous enough about this story as it is.

**The Dark of You**

The nightmares were expected.

Dying and then coming back to life was bound to leave a mark on the human psyche and Jim had no illusions that he was any different. He wasn’t surprised to wake up every other night drenched in sweat, still expecting to be inside that horrible chamber, his body quickly succumbing to the fatal radiation dose of the warp core. The fear usually faded within seconds and the nightmares had been getting less frequent in the two months that had passed since the incident.

But in the past two weeks Jim had realized that something was wrong with his body. He would frequently feel nauseous, there were sudden feelings of faintness at random moments and two nights ago he had woken up coughing blood.

The blood had been the last straw and Jim currently found himself sitting on the examination table in the medical apartment of the _Enterprise,_ Bones standing beside him and frowning at whatever the display in his hand was showing him.

Jim raised an eyebrow inquiringly. “Well? Any ideas what’s wrong with me?”

“I’m not sure,” Bones replied warily. “The readings look somewhat familiar, but it can’t be what I think it is. I didn’t think it was possible…”

When he offered no explanations, Jim met his gaze head-on. “What exactly is not possible?”

Bones swallowed, his eyes dropping once again to the readings as though he was hoping they would suddenly show something different. Then he sighed heavily. “Your blood cells are collapsing, Jim. I saw similar readings – though in a much more advanced stage obviously – before I injected you with Khan’s blood.”

Jim froze. “You mean after the radiation of the warp core killed me.”

“Yes,” Bones admitted reluctantly.

“But how is this possible? I was doing fine for the last two months.”

His friend looked almost as distressed as Jim felt. “I thought giving you Khan’s blood had cured you. Your cells were as good as new whenever I examined you. But it seems like it was only a temporary fix. It’s a slower process than last time but it seems like the symptoms are returning now that the bastard’s blood is out of your system and not affecting your body any longer.”

Jim closed his eyes. He had thought that he had made it, that it was over. But it seemed like cheating death had been a miracle too big, even for his unprecedented streak of luck. He took a deep breath and then opened his eyes to look at his friend. “How much time do I have left?”

The doctor hesitated. “I can’t say for sure. At the rate it is going, I would say you only have a few weeks, perhaps two or maybe three.”

Jim nodded as he took in the information. “Thank you for letting me know. I will inform Starfleet of my condition, maybe they have an idea what we could do.” It was a lie and they both knew it. Jim was a dead man walking, he had been since the day he had sacrificed his life in order to save his crew. As it seemed there was no cheating death and the consequences of his actions were catching up on Jim. “I have to talk to Spock, he has to take up the command of the Enterprise until I’m…” He cleared his throat, rephrasing what he had been about to say. “Until I’m better.”

Not that Bones was so easily fooled, sympathy apparent in his eyes as he nodded. “Of course. I’ll send your medical files to Starfleet, I’m sure the doctors there are better equipped to help you. They will find a solution, I’m certain of that.”

Jim forced a reassuring smile on his face. “Thank you, Bones.”

He got off the table and put his shirt back on, his thoughts reeling with this turn of events while he was making his way back towards the bridge. With how close he had come to losing his life multiple times already (and having died once), one would imagine he was better prepared to face the reality of his demise. But it was one thing to make a split-second decision that could potentially include sacrificing his life to save the people he loved, and something entirely else to soldier on while having to face the certainty of his death every single day.

The doors opened as he entered the bridge of his ship, Sulu’s announcement breaking him from his thoughts. “Captain on the bridge.”

Jim let his eyes wander slowly over his crewmates before they inevitably settled on his first officer standing beside the captain’s chair. “Commander Spock, I need a word with you in private.”

His voice was steady but his expression must give something away because Spock frowned slightly even as he obeyed and followed Jim over the corridors, away from the bridge until they entered his room. There, Jim stood with his face turned towards the window, nothing but the open space of the universe visible outside.

He couldn’t bring himself to speak and when the silence began to stretch, it was for once Spock who broke it first. “Is everything alright, Captain? You seem… distressed.”

Despite the situation Jim had to stifle a hysterical laugh. “Because that’s accurate, I _am_ distressed. A lot actually.” He fell silent again, but this time Spock just watched him, clearly waiting for him to gather his thoughts in his own time. Eventually Jim found the strength to meet the Vulcan’s inquiring gaze. “I visited Bones this morning.”

Spock tilted his head. “Because of an illness? It has not escaped my attention that you have not been feeling well for almost two weeks now.”

Jim nodded. “Yeah, I…” He cleared his throat. Goddamn, this was hard! “I’m dying, Spock.”

The Vulcan stared at him for a moment, expression frozen in confusion before it slowly made way for disbelief. “I am afraid I don’t understand.”

“Khan’s blood,” Jim elaborated. “Apparently its healing effects are fading, now that it is no longer in my system.”

Realization dawned on Spock’s face. “The radiation from the ship’s warp core.”

“Exactly. I will contact Starfleet right away, maybe there is a way to fix me. The _Enterprise_ will be under your command until I’m back.”

“Considering all we know, chances of a cure for the dose of radiation you have been exposed to, are close to zero percent.”

Again Jim had to chuckle. “You really know how to pep talk a guy, Spock.”

***

_Three days later_

“You can’t be serious!”

Jim stared disbelievingly at Admiral Neuer, waiting for him to explain himself.

The tall blond regarded him calmly. “It is the only possible solution to save your life. I understand your doubts, some other members of Starfleet expressed similar concerns. But the blood of one of the augments is the only cure we know of at this moment. Therefore waking Khan from his cryosleep again is the only solution we have.”

Jim looked over to Admiral Lewandowski, waiting for him to object but the raven-haired man remained silent, standing by the decision of his colleague and friend. Jim shook his head. “This is crazy. That man is a killing machine, you saw what happened when Admiral Marcus woke him up to use him for his own purposes. That man killed dozens of lives and almost destroyed San Francisco! And now that we finally have him subdued – which almost cost me my life by the way – you just want us to wake him up again?!”

Admiral Lewandowski stepped forward. “There is no other way. His blood is the only cure and we can only extract it from him if he is unfrozen. We already tried replicating his blood and its healing components from the sample Doctor McCoy took to save your life, but so far we have been unsuccessful.”

Jim turned around towards his two friends, finding said doctor and Spock standing there with disapproving but in the end resigned faces. At Jim’s indignant look Bones shrugged helplessly. “He is right, Jim. We need more of Khan’s blood and apparently you need it in regular intervals to stay healthy. I’m sorry.”

Jim turned to Spock pleadingly. “We could wake him up, take the blood we need and then freeze him again. He doesn’t have to stay conscious in between, right?”

“I’m afraid that is not possible in the long run, Captain” Spock argued in his usual far too composed way. “There is only so many times a human body can be put into cryosleep again and again and even Khan’s superior DNA has its limits, especially when he is being put under again and can’t let his body heal from the strain of the cryosleep as well as the continued blood loss.”

“Fine,” Jim spat, knowing that his anger was misguided because none of this was Spock’s fault, but he was unable to keep his emotions from rising. “So no freezing him again. What about keeping him in a coma?”

It was McCoy who answered him. “You realize what a coma does, right? It shuts down the body’s functions to the absolute bare minimum which is counterproductive for our purpose. We are not talking about pricking Khan’s arm and drawing a little viol of blood every few weeks. It’s a full blood transfusion, we are using him to cleanse your entire body of a deadly dose of radiation. If we keep his body from healing properly, we would be draining him eventually and then we are back to square one with you.”

Goddamn, Bones and Spock always were in each other’s hair. Why did the one time they managed to agree have to be over the matter of a superhuman terrorist and mass murderer?

Jim turned back to the two admirals. “Can’t we choose someone else? We have 72 other augments frozen somewhere in this building. I’d rather have to keep one of them as a prisoner on my ship than Khan. Anyone else.”

Admiral Neuer shook his head again. “We discussed that option extensively but ultimately had to reject it. All of Khan’s crewmates are sentenced war criminals and while we all agree that Khan is the smartest and therefore most dangerous one of them all, he is already acclimated to our time and culture. If we wake up one of the others, we have to inform them casually that they have been frozen for over two hundred years, are now prisoners of the same organization that sentenced them to this fate mere days ago and on top of that, our sole reason for choosing to wake them up now, is to be a living blood bag for a Starfleet captain that helped sabotage the plans of their own captain. I’m sure that will go over spectacularly.”

Jim swallowed down his protests, knowing that his superiors were right. Khan was the only choice they had and he should be grateful that Starfleet was even considering his life worthy of waking up a highly dangerous criminal.

He gave up his protests with a weary sigh. “I understand. But I don’t think he will cooperate with us.”

“He will,” Admiral Neuer replied confidently. “As long as there is the tiniest chance of escape for him, he will grasp at that straw. Doctor McCoy will have to put a confinement collar on him, it will ensure that Khan can’t leave his cell or hurt one of you without being punished for it. Even for Khan there is no way to escape with this collar keeping him in check. He will certainly try to manipulate you, so no matter what he says or does, keep in mind that Khan is not a real human. He can lie and pretend but ultimately he is nothing more than what he was designed to be. A weapon and nothing else. He doesn’t care about love or honor, the only thing that matters to him is his own personal gain. He will do anything to survive, so don’t let him fool you into thinking that any part of him is capable of caring about others.”

Jim remained silent as a memory rose to the forefront of his mind. Him and Spock confronting the augment about the men in the torpedoes, about the truth of Admiral Marcus’ motive for awakening such a dangerous man. He remembered clearly the pain in Khan’s voice when he had talked about his crew, how Marcus was blackmailing him, the tear streaks on his cheeks as he had turned around to face them…

_Is there anything you would not do for your family, Kirk?_

The words had been drenched in despair. Could all of this truly have been an act? Could a man that was presumably incapable of love, understand this emotion deeply enough to fake it so believingly?

Jim forced the unwelcome doubt out of his thoughts, reminding himself that Khan had killed Pike, the man he had considered to be almost a father. Khan didn’t deserve his sympathy, no matter the reasons for his actions.

“I understand, sir,” he forced himself to say. “I will inform the rest of my crew of this situation and we will make the necessary preparations while Doctor McCoy joins your medical staff.”

Like he had expected Bones’s silence barely lasted until they had been dismissed by the two admirals and were crossing the corridors of the building. The doctor’s expression was dark with anger and concern. “This is a bad idea! If it wasn’t your life on the line, Jim, I would refuse to be a part of this!”

At Jim’s other side, Spock intervened diplomatically. “I agree that this is a less than ideal outcome. But as Admiral Neuer said, the collar will keep even Khan in check.”

Jim was still doubtful that a small collar could tame a beast like Khan was, but Bones responded before he could even open his mouth. “That’s exactly why I have second thoughts about this whole thing! There is a reason why these collars are not permitted any longer.”

“What do you mean?” Jim asked, not liking the sound of that.

“They were used in the slave trading business,” Bones responded, careful to keep his voice down. “Depending on how the collar is programmed, it deals out punishments whenever the slave disobeys their master in any way. The thing is, most slaves eventually accept what they are and will learn obedience. Khan however was a king among men, an emperor designed to be superior to us. Do these people truly expect he will just lie down and accept this condition?”

Jim swallowed hard as he tried to imagine it, Khan realizing that he was bound to beings he considered inferior to him. “He’s gonna be furious.”

Bones nodded. “As the captain of the ship and the one with the most contact to him apart from myself, Khan’s collar will be tied to you. Once installed, only your fingerprints and voice can get that thing off him, so be careful around him. You will be his utmost priority for a long time to come.”

Jim grimaced. “He tricked me once, but that won’t happen again. I know his mind games now and I have no intention of being anywhere near him unless it is for the blood transfusion.”

With that resolve he and Spock followed Bones down to the storage chamber where the 73 cryotubes containing the genetically altered augments were lined up next to each other like corpses in a giant morgue. Almost inconspicuous among their midst was the tube containing the man whose actions had briefly cost Jim his life.

And ironically the only man who could also save it.

**Author's Note:**

> I appreciate feedback, it keeps me motivated. So please don't be shy and drop a comment and/or kudos.


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